Deen looks like he robbed a bank.
I’m either hearing a quantum leap in Rich Homie Quan’s product on his latest tape or I’m just on holiday mode. But I suspect that I Promise I Will Never Stop Going In may actually let Quan live up to the title of project. And I’m being completely honest, I wasn’t expecting SH!T (if you see what I did there, DM me on Twitter and I’ll send you a turkey for the holidays).
See, I was one of the “early adopters” on Wealthy Colleague Quan whenever the fuck “Some Kinda Way” dropped. We can all admit that song was incredible – arguably this year’s song of the summer. Based on the promise of that single and his passing similarities to Future Adu, I anticipated that the mixtape it was on – Still Goin In Reloaded would contain a bunch of great songs. I was wrong. “Some Kinda Way” was so far above anything else on that tape that I figured he’d be on YC status within a year. “Who’s YC” you ask? Exactly.
Nonetheless, I was eager to give this new effort a listen. After all, Future keeps stalling and releasing alternate hits (“Honest”) and misses (‘whatever the fuck that song with 2 androgynous white niggas is called’). So I figured that I could step off the reservation for a minute and see what the fuck this new Affluent Confidant Quan hitting fo. But I really wasn’t expecting much based on the last tape and his relative lack of hits compared to the other cats that have occupied the ‘sanging-ass-rapper’ slot over the last few years, i.e., T-Pain & Future Dylan. The only thing he’s done post-“Some Kinda Way” that caught my attention was the hook on YG and Jeezy’s “My Nigga.” That was dope, but sang-rappers usually hit us with a flurry of hits.
Well, smack my girl’s ass and call her ‘Shirley’ because this Opulent Companion Quan tape is incredible. Turns out this nigga was saving all the heat for HIS own shit. Rappers pay attention. Given that there probably isn’t enough time for this shit to revert to the mean, I’m probably going to claim that it’s one of the best things I’ve heard this year. That’s what they call ‘showing your hand’.
Based on my prognostications, best case scenario for this tape was a decent Gucci Mane level mixtape. You know what I mean; 17 to 20+ tracks with 3 or 4 keepers and tons of trash. Yeah, I was wrong as fuck. There’s probably a crap track or two in the bunch, but there are so many catchy ass gems that I can’t even recall what those songs sounded like. Nigga got like 10 single quality jams on this shit!
Even more impressive is Prosperous Amigo Quan’s lack of an obvious crutch on the tape (see what I did there? I’m getting decent at this). I’m fairly certain that no two hooks on the tape sound alike and he only has 3 guests on the project – and he’s probably better than all of them – even if Young Thug is an interesting sounding fella. And if you think the success of his single was largely based on the production, you’ll be interested to learn that the guy that made that beat doesn’t even show up on this shit. Quan basically carries this thing with humourous ruminations on jail, the come up, money, romance and vices – all delivered with that aggressive croak and more technique than you’d expect based on what you’ve heard to date.
So yeah, it’s Future Spears’ move now. Rich Homie Quan is here to stay. The man sounds a lot more comfortable with his style and you can hear the results on I Promise I Will Never Stop Going In. This shit finna take some topping and it’ll just fine until R.Kelly lea… whoa! That was almost a poor word choice…
